Despite how I manage my circumstances, it is still hell. And I don’t want someone innocent, especially someone I love, get lassoed into the mess. I will deal with my demons. I just want you to be happy. Blindly.

it is only through rotting that you can bloom.

the jellyfish life.

(floating around and just vibing through the waves and mostly in the depths – simply existing because you’re theoretically immortal. defying fate and biology, almost. still haven’t succumbed to the forces of nature. thankful for another day that you’re not eaten by the turtles (yet). no one knows what you’re up to, where you are, if you’re still even there, since well…you’re see-through. you’re here for a moment, but with a stray current you’re gone. if you know, you know.)

everyday, I grieve for the version of myself that I used to be. in some ways, I’ve evolved to become someone that I used to dream of; dry, folded and clean, only ever watching from the safety of the edge — longingly looking at the half of me that has been left behind at the bottom, now obscured by the rising tides.

once in a while, I try to wade through the current to reach her again, but the water washes me away, back to where it’s shallow. 

it is odd, for it feels like I’ve forgotten how to swim. 

I don’t know if I should keep reaching into the past, to the part of me that’s slowly fading away into the depths. 

I don’t know if it is worth the peril of losing the rest of what I still have, in order to complete the missing pieces. if it’s the only way to feel myself whole again, or if it’s nothing but the mirage of what the past used to be, or what it once promised.

I don’t know if letting go is the only way to keep going, to forget and leave those parts to decay. swallowed by the water, by the tides of time telling me I am no longer who I used to be.

is it only possible to become new if you fully discard the broken parts that dragged and crawled out of the storm and led you here? to the safety of the shore, where it washed and folded you neatly, only for you to forget and remove yourself from who it was that saved you, and to gradually watch it fade away like foam?

a lost jellyfish curls up my leg / soft touch / thistle veil / a whisper / bitter / venom biting / in currents / in channels. // 

I also / soften. //

I almost get swayed, but then my dream transitions to a dilapidated mansion in the middle of the sea. No walls, just floor beams and the occasional cotton stuffing in between the rotten panels. I can picture how the hallways used to wrap around every floor. He was there too. I didn’t approach him. He didn’t approach me. Someone lights a key match. To burn the house down.

I wake up.

EXT. HONG KONG CULTURAL CENTER – Quarter to Noon

after eleven years… it feels like reconnecting with an old childhood friend. there’s a fondness for the familiar noise I can’t pinpoint; a rosy nostalgic filter resting over the cityscape. most things seem completely the same. 

and yet in some ways, everything has changed.

something that only existed in my mind’s eye before now exists in the physical realm.

my heart skipped a beat for the first time in a while. the sky saturates into a sapphire blue.

I miss the act of writing just for the sake of writing.

Not expecting much from myself, not waiting for a masterpiece to be born. Not writing to sell, not writing to meet expectations. Not worried if the words sound juvenile, not concerned about how it translates. Not for the eyes, not for the opinion. Not for the good enough, not for the critical praise. Not for the prize, not for the distraction.

I miss the act of writing just for the sake of writing.

朽ち果てても咲く

PALE, ALMOST BLUE, SLICK WITH SALT.

A FORGOTTEN MEMORY THAT BREAKS THE WATER LIKE A PRAYER SLIPPING THROUGH THE MOUTH.

LIKE A DROWNED THING THAT REFUSES TO BE BURIED. BEAUTIFUL IN THE WAY DEAD THINGS ARE WHEN THEY’VE WASHED UP ON THE SHORE, GLIMMERING AND RUINED ALL AT ONCE.

“My heart feels like it’s whole again when I’m with him.”

“And when you’re apart?” he asks, his tone holding a certain softness that curls around the deep timbre, “How does your heart feel then?”

“It feels like… my heart has walked away from me altogether.” My voice is quiet when I respond, despite the weight the words bolster. “And I have to wait with bated breath until I see it again.”

“And what if your heart…doesn’t come back?’”

“Then… I’ll just have to learn to live without a heart.”

– EXCERPT FROM AN UNPUBLISHED DRAFT.

I’m learning to live life normally again. After years. Things are slow. But they are improving. I’m enjoying the slowness and stillness for now.

a soul’s immortality is a curse until it meets its other half.

the art of noticing.

for to be loved is to be seen.